When I first started my company the wedding industry was a pretty different place than the terrain my team and I are navigating now 15 years later in 2025. Pinterest did not yet exist, websites (if you had one) were basic with few static pages, and Instagram was exclusive to imagery you took through the app in real time. Valencia-heavy filtered flat lay photos of avocado toast, anyone? It felt like a simpler time as a creative business owner – my age likely has a lot to do with this sentiment – where inspiration had to be authentically hunted for and processes weren’t yet so nuanced.

My own business has evolved a few times since those early days. Changes have been made out of both necessity at times and in other circumstances, made because of a heart pull in an opposite direction. From serving in those early days as a wedding coordinator and evolving into a full service luxury wedding planner and designer, to adding floral services to our offerings in 2014, starting a family shortly thereafter, deciding pre-pandemic to close the planning side of the business to reevaluate what should come next, and ultimately landing on a business model that honored what we do best and what we love the most, we’re now in a pretty comfortable and fulfilling groove as a full service floral and design company that offers a very exclusive niche service in the Midwest market and beyond.

While the responsibilities my team and I have as wedding designers vary from that of a traditional wedding planner, it’s understandable how to someone new to the industry – namely, a person seeking help conceptualizing of their most treasured life milestones! – could feel incredibly confused on how a wedding designer differs from a wedding planner and knowing what person or company is the best fit for each unique client and celebration. There’s admittedly a bit of overlap on who does what given both roles so I hope to outline here not so much these differences or the overlap but instead the specific benefits of an experienced wedding designer, and especially one who also serves as a floral designer, like me!

So let’s start here: one big metaphorical-type example I give to clients when it’s not clear on my wedding designer role in comparison to a wedding planner’s role is that we are to the wedding planner like an architect and interior designer duo is to the home builder. While a home builder usually assesses location, lot, home size, scale, structural integrity, logistics of the build process, management of many often unseen moving parts, code regulations, and is typically the overarching leader of the project, an architect and interior designer are more focused on the logistics as they pertain to the aesthetic.

An example worth considering? A builder will want to assess the best way to grade a tree-heavy lot with limited acreage so that a ranch style home with a side entry garage can fit best on it, while an architect will take the ranch style home and based on the client’s needs and wants find a way to suggest foundational choices in agreeance with the builder’s feedback that will drive the aesthetics; like 12 foot ceilings with curved archways into each room to give the illusion of a bigger space. Or what type of ceiling supports are best to honor the decorative wood gable beams that will bring an aesthetic quality to the main living space.

It’s also important to note how critical it is – truly it’s one of the most important elements for me when it comes to a successful and seamless experience with a client – that if they are separate people from separate companies to find a wedding planner and wedding designer that compliment one another’s strengths and fill in for one another’s weaknesses. Because the likelihood of both respective professionals’ services overlapping is high, as a client having people on your wedding planning team who are humble, honest, hardworking, and able to put their ego aside for the greater good of the client and success of the event is really the secret ingredient in the magic-making.

Some other notable considerations in favor of an Experienced Wedding Designer, all examples of things we offer via RBC that set us apart from other design teams, are shared throughout the remainder of this blog post.

Floorplan Conceptualization

An experienced wedding designer will spearhead the process of building out a comprehensive and thoughtful floorplan. And I mean the kind of floorplan as it relates to the reception space(s) as a whole beyond just the number of tables. Even better is this perk of ‘floorplan creation’ if the wedding designer also serves as a floral designer. A well-presented reception space is the result of many moving parts that include but are not limited to: tablescapes and their respective rentals like chairs, placesettings, linens and event stationery, candles, and floral, and other ground level rentals like staging, dance floors, flooring, anchored structures, displays, and vignettes. A basic floorplan is always a great start for any wedding but an experienced wedding designer will bring a room to life even on paper with creative ideas that consider all angles, nook, and nuances of the room. Like a blueprint for a new home build, the floorplan is the foundation of the wedding, a sturdy base in which all things built upon it must be supported.

This is also a category where there is significant overlap between the responsibilities of a wedding planner and wedding designer. Which is why some planners offer design services! While a wedding designer can create a visually-driven plan with cognizance to the whole room and their aesthetic parts, a planner will do their part to ensure the plan functions properly, meets fire code regulations, that catering staff have ample space to get around, and will ensure the media teams (photo and video) are aware of the plan ahead of time so they can plan out their angles and shots. It really is a collaborative effort to create a floorplan that functions as beautifully as it looks.

Comprehensive Day-Of Set Up & Strike Collaboration

The day-of set up at any wedding is a beast. There are endless moving parts, people trying to work carefully but quickly in close proximity with one another, emotional expectations to not only meet but exceed, unexpected elements that even with the best planning and intentions can make things difficult (rain, wind, early guests!), and of course a stringent timeline that has to be respected. Most professionals have day-of set up down to a science. And our team is no exception.

But event ‘strike’ – a fancy term for the process of ‘cleaning up’ – is a portion of the timeline that I think is an afterthought for many. And without an experienced wedding designer on board it’s often not clear at the end of the night who holds the responsibility for tearing out and cleaning up the aesthetic-related items that need to be handled. Obviously ample communication ahead of the wedding can ensure it’s clear who is to do what at the end of the event but for us we always make sure our preferred planners know that if we suggested it, orchestrated it, or brought it to the event we will make sure someone OTHER than the wedding planner is responsible for taking care of it. Not only does this honor our responsibility to the client but it also ensures the wedding planner isn’t standing around at 1:00 am utterly exhausted and frustrated because there are 35 flower centerpieces, burnt down taper candles, food-stained dinner menus, and other miscellaneous decor elements that need handling but shouldn’t fall on the wedding planner to do so.

We firmly believe that a beautiful wedding is only as ‘admirable’ and memorable as the type of note it heads out on; with happy clients AND professionals who are committed fully to handling the very tasks and tangibles they are responsible for until the very last vehicle leaves the event site.

The Wedding Designer Advantage when Floral Design is Involved

While not every experienced wedding designer also provides floral design services, we do at RBC and this part of our craft is the heartbeat of what we do. It would be very difficult in the Midwest wedding industry for us to successfully market ourselves as wedding designs without the ability to design flowers just like it’s often hard for wedding planners to market themselves to clientele without having experience in the comprehensive wedding design realm. This is not necessarily the case in higher end luxury markets when overall wedding budgets are higher making it more likely that a logistics specific planner AND a full service designer both have a necessary position on the team, but this is exactly what we are trying to encourage and shout from the rooftops regardless of the market we’re in. There is space for both! And especially because we’ve got the knowledge, skills, experience, and eagerness as floral designers.

Consider this: a beautiful flower centerpiece placed on a tablecloth-covered surface with lackluster china and plastic resin folding chairs in a room with no natural light is going to look nice to the average person. Flowers in and of themselves are really something special which is why there’s such a universal love for flowers in many forms; we welcome babies into the world, celebrate the departure of loved ones from it, and mark every milestone in between with flowers. To the average person it’s hard to go wrong with flowers. But consider this same beautiful flower centerpiece placed on a textural weave patterned linen that perfectly kisses the ground in a naturally lit conservatory with color-coordinated china, personalized embossed menu cards atop of each velvet napkin, and placesettings that feel as welcoming and approachable as they space they exist in. All of a sudden the flowers become even more beautiful because they environment they’re put in has been intentionally planned for for maximum aesthetic pay off. And sometimes the tone of a rose, the shape of a petal, or the integrity of how a flower grows in nature can dictate the entire direction of an event’s aesthetic, making the role of an experienced wedding designer and floral designer under one company, very attractive.

Finally! It would be grossly ignorant of me not to share that there are many wedding planners in both the global industry and of course here in the Midwest who offer the broad scope of full design services similar to what we offer but on top of the planning and logistics guidance that I do not. There are also wedding planners who offer full wedding design services AND floral design services, which is a trifecta of expertise many people do want and need, and one that deserves a lot of credit (my team and I know this workload well! We did this for years for our clients!). Acting like our services are the right fit for anyone and everyone would be naive of me.

Additionally, while creatively I personally feel most fulfilled and exhilarated when I can serve as a floral AND event designer (I also find my job is done most thoroughly this way), there are many contracts we take on where our roles are exclusive to floral services only and we let the planner take the lead on the event design and respective logistics. Again, finding a professional who can clearly illustrate what they do best as well as what they do not will help a client make the right decision on which company and team of professionals will best meet their needs.

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If you’re looking for a team of creative, energized, thoughtful, and experienced designers and florists to visually bring your milestone event to life, we’d love to talk with you and are now accepting 2026 contracts. Please email Rhi at [email protected] or visit our website for more information on how to set up complimentary consultation. We’d be thrilled to connect with you and be a part of your next chapter!

Professionals involved in the mock up seen throughout this post are listed below. Which speaking of mock ups you might find this post helpful! And you might want to visit this post as the final leg of your journey. It’s the wedding that pairs together with the photos above. It’s always fun to see how a mock up ebbs and flows to what ends up being the final aesthetic!

Design & Floral: Rhiannon Bosse Celebrations / Planning: Paper Hat Weddings / Photography: Kelly Sweet Photography / Linens: Nuage Designs Inc / Flower Farms: Creekside Growers / Rentals: Event Theory Michigan / Stationery: Studio Y Creative / Custom Soap Bar Favors: RB Soap Co.